I’ve been saving up a nice down payment over the past year. I’m pre qualified and the credit union I have is willing to work with me on just about anything (family is the VP of lending and I’ve been with them for my whole life).But I just can’t find anything that doesn’t need a ton of work or is way overpriced so I’ve been looking at land as an option to build on. I don’t need to move any time soon and the longer I’m here the more I can save.My idea is to build a garage with a loft apartment and build a house eventually. Renting would be an easy option because it overlooks a lake with waterfront access. The undecided factor right now would be the size. Comfort vs price.I have family and friends with various expertises that can help me build (and have built many houses). I also have some connections to building materials.The area is socioeconomicicly lower middle class but this stretch of road is above average for housing prices. It’s also one of if not the last land undeveloped on the lake. And has the exact acreage I’d like. The price is high but I know the seller and it’s been on the market for some time so I’m confident it’s negotiable into the range of “not great but good deal” given the resale value with the plans and budget I have.Does anyone else have experience in this route? I’m curious what what worked and didn’t work for you. Good and bad stories welcome.

I am buying a house that is 9 years old. It had an inspection done 2 years ago, and the seller is willing to let us see it. Me and a couple family members were planning on just looking at the house ourselves. We’re not experts, but we’ve all had experience in remodeling homes. Is it a bad idea to forgo the inspection and just do it ourselves? Or would the previous inspection, and our inspection be enough?

Yet another interesting headline in the world of health and well-being. #NPRreads: White Privilege, FBI Director’s Remarks On Policing, And Oyster Farming
Also this week: A story from an NPR Music reporter about the “lost art of listening.”

Yet another interesting headline in the world of health and well-being. Medical Students Crunch Big Data To Spot Health Trends
It’s not enough anymore to learn how to size up the symptoms of a particular patient, say specialists in bioinformatics. Modern doctors need to learn to see patterns in huge data sets, too.

Yet another interesting headline in the world of health and well-being. Jane Goodall Wants To Save Us (And Her Beloved Chimps) From Ourselves
She’s learned a lot about chimpanzees. But what’s she learned from them has given her a new mission: improve the health of the planet.

Going to try to provide this in bullets to make it an easy timeline:I have a small piece of undeveloped land in a thriving urban community.There are properties adjacent to mine that would allow for a full-block of land for a commercial developer (4-story loft condos and row houses are popping up in many locations just blocks from my property)I engaged a realtor that I had tried for another transaction but had fell through (my fault) and I felt like I owed it to him to give him a listing although, he made it pretty clear that it was below his threshold of business he normally takes (hundred thousands vs. millions).Plan was to assemble all four adjacent parcels to make the one block a full listing. One owner (who shares the corner with me) used my realtor. The other two parcels were put up For Sale By Owner.Originally we were going to hold out for Tax Incremental Financing because the property is just a block outside of the blighted area coverage on either side.Realtor advised that blighted status was unlikely without petitioning the city and a long strenuous process, costly too.We list our small corner with the agent even though, “It’s very unlikely that someone will want to buy this small of a corner”A week later we get an offer on our property that is just 5% shy of the listing price. Our realtor advises to accept since, “There won’t be any more like this any time soon.” *I ask lots of questions about the buyer but all is vague. Realtor goes high pressure on getting us to commit. We agree to the offer.Realtor goes Dual Agent and sends through the dual agent form. Then he sends through the purchase agreement. WTF? Now he’s working for the buyer too. *Buyer wants all the land (even though realtor isn’t telling us this directly, he is saying things like, “Your neighbor is going to be kicking himself that he lost out on this good of a deal”)Purchase Agreement intact. City Council Meeting takes place. Blighted area likely to extend to our property in December.Buyer is supposed to close on November 12th but is asking for a 3-week extension on a Phase 2 survey (not agreed to in our contract)We decline the extension. 1. Because we eliminated the ability to extend the purchase agreement in the initial rounds of negotiations and 2. Our property is worth 50-60% more with Tax Incremental Financing. and 3. We sort of think he is just trying to get us to extend so that he can try to assemble the other parcels and we don’t really want to wait around for that to happen.Did I just get bamboozled and what would you do in this situation?

So I signed a 1-year lease in august for an apartment complex. Now, in October, they are asking everyone to “re-up” and sign another one year lease for next august/renew their lease. They say people have until the 31st to sign another lease, before they start renting out the units to others. Can they do this? It seems like such a shitty/scummy thing to do to coerce the tenants into signing another year before the 1st is even 1/3 up.